Remington Rohan was not a rule follower.

Former model (though not one of the “super” kind), successful influencer and life coach. Currently paid to tell people how to achieve the best from their lives and careers. In other words, a complete contradiction to how he preferred to live—namely, on his own terms and without input from others.

Everything about his life was going according to plan.

Until he started spending way too much time with a woman who defied his prejudices and challenged his beliefs.

Lydia Larkin was not a genius.

Gifted, clever, and stubborn. Raised on star maps and Hendrix, she was born an explorer. Temporarily tied down to a private sector science job, she knew she was biding her time before she was off to discover and build something new.

Not one to let society tell her who she was, she wasn’t about to let a professional influencer tell her she had to change to be happy.

Buckle up and brace for impact.

Exclusive Excerpt:

“Guests are supposed to be announced.”

Remington jolted to a stop on the stairs leading up to Lydia’s apartment. The man at the landing below him shoved his glasses up his nose and crossed his arms.

Huh.

Remington tried not to make it too obvious as his eyes skated over the peeling and patchy paint on the walls , or the dim overhead lighting because one or two bulbs hadn’t been replaced yet. It didn’t really give off “guests must be announced” type of vibe.

The man with the glasses pulled his shoulders back and stuck out his chin. “What resident are you here for?”

Remington narrowed his eyes and licked his bottom lip. But he didn’t answer.

Remington couldn’t help it, he cracked a smile. He wouldn’t describe Lydia as loud or dangerous.

“Brunette, smart, sassy,” Remington returned with a smirk.

“You tell 4B she can’t be having men come and go at all hours. She knows the rules.”

“I’ll be sure to remind her,” Remington sighed and continued up the stairs. How many men were stopping by to see Lydia? So many that her neighbors were complaining? Remington shook his head. It didn’t matter to him. He was just her friend.

With the first knock on the door, it swung open.

“Larkin?” he asked as he stepped inside, the hairs standing up on the back of his neck.

Light singing reached his ears and he followed the sound, his hairs going back to their regular place as he picked out the lyrics.

Led Zeppelin’s “Since I’ve Been Loving You.”

He stopped when he reached the open window to her balcony. If you could even call it that. A stone platform jutted out from the roof of the building and sloped down to the picture window in her living room. The glass of the window was removed and set against the wall. It was only a ten inch step up and out onto the platform.

Remington took that step and joined Lydia outside. Though she hadn’t noticed him yet.

Earbuds in, hair in a mess at the top of her head, jeans that had seen better days, and a wine-colored shirt with a band name on it he couldn’t read anymore because it had been rubbed off—she was bent over a small planter, crooning one of his favorite Led Zeppelin songs to the leaves.

Her body jolted and she sucked a breath when she caught sight of him.

“Newton’s second pair of knickers, you scared me,” she breathed out around a laugh.

Remington arched an eyebrow and lifted his chin to the plants before her. “Were you just singing to them?”

She glanced down and back up, not looking embarrassed in the least. “Don’t you sing to the things you love?”

He tilted his head at her question and she rolled her eyes. What a silly man he must seem to her. What kinds of things did she know and just kept right on treating him like he should know them too.

Heidi Hutchinson was born in South Dakota and raised the exact right distance away from the Black Hills. She had an overactive imagination very early on, and wasted no time in getting most of her friends in trouble due to her unrealistic and completely ridiculous ideas. Seeing as she was so lazy and also afraid people would think she was bonkers, she didn't write down any of the story lines that played out in her daydreams.

During her high school years, she took pen to paper and filled more notebooks than she is proud of with angsty, depressing, self-deprecating poetry. This led to her writing down more things: notes, ideas, character bios, plot twists that had no plot yet to twist. After years of cleaning up her own scraps of imagination with nothing solid to hold on to, she sat down and wrote the story that had been in her head the longest. Fueled by coffee and her unwavering and perfectly normal devotion to Dave Grohl, she discovered a writer living inside of her.

She still lives in the Midwest, though not as close to the Black Hills as she would prefer, with her alarmingly handsome husband and their fearless child. They eat more pizza than God intended and she listens to her music the same way she lives: loudly.